Citizen Kane

Looking through the course book the other day, Movie Game Book: A Serious Pursuit of Film Trivia, I saw a list in the back of the book. It was a list of the best movies from about 1895 to the present. The first movie on the list was Citizen Kane, which I found a little interesting especially since it is the movie that we are watching and studying to begin the year. I found it interesting that it was the movie we were studying first and that it was number one on the list.

The movie, on a whole, was about a five and a half out of ten in my opinion. Their were parts that made me laugh, parts that made me wonder, parts that made me question, parts that had me totally interested, parts that had me totally lost, and parts that had me totally bored. The funny thing is that my attitude inside the movie changed from scene to scene. Still speaking in reference to the whole movie, I really liked the storyline once I figured it out. I'm not just talking about the whole Rosebud deal either. I didn't figure out what Rosebud meant until the end, but until I found out that the whole movie was centered on that phrase and his death, I was totally lost, confused, and bored. At that point is when I got into the movie more.

Speaking on behalf of Citizen Kane's storyline, I actually thought it was pretty neat both the idea of the storyline as well as how they progressed the movie to fit the storyline. I like mysterious movies where you are trying to figure out something about someone or what they said and things like that. That is what mainly kept me interested in the movie - trying to figure out what Charles Kane's dying words meant. Sometimes I am surprised and then sometimes I already guess what happens. In this case, I was surprised because I was in no way expecting the word to mean what it did. I actually liked it and thought it was pretty neat that it was the center of the whole movie progression - his childhood and him wanting that back. In this case, I thought it was very well done.

Since the storyline was the main part of why I liked the movie, what makes the movie a little low on the rating scale for me is the fact that I completely disliked the beginning. Personally, for me, the most crucial part of a movie is having an excellent beginning, and in my opinion, the movie did not accomplish this. The beginning was very vague and uninteresting and kept me wondering what the heck was going on. When I realized the storyline of the movie, I then started realizing the beginning did not represent the movie as a whole very well.

On a side note, I thought the movie demonstrated the things we covered in the very first class when you lectured about different parts of a film very well. I saw many examples of angles, lighting, movement, focus, and different shots that was talked about at that class. This, in my opinion, is the reason why I think it was a decent movie to start with for this year's class.

Overall, like I said, with the exception of the beginning, the movie was pretty good. A flowing middle and an excellent ending contributed to the movie's success. I can see in some instances why many would think the classic, Citizen Kane, would be one of the best movies out there.

-Kevin